LONGMONT -- It stands sentry in east Longmont, a relic of the city's agricultural roots, greeting visitors and piquing interest.

That interest is evident by fences strung with barbed wire and signs warning off trespassers drawn to the crumbling sugar factory, looking for adventures, shelter or maybe even items to salvage. Others, apparently, are looking for a little recognition. Graffiti, adventurous and otherwise, are scribbled on some of the walls of the factory.

Two silos north of the factory still tower over the city and are still filled with sugar, but it was not made on site. Instead, it is a storage facility for the Western Sugar Cooperative.

Jim Mitton, who worked two "campaigns" as a bin man in 1974 and 1975, said he remembers when the work of the factory would permeate Longmont.

"There was always this sort-of sweet, semi sweet smell over the city," he recalled. "Most people kinda liked it. I don't remember it being a bad smell."

The work was sometimes backbreaking, he said. He remembers enormous piles of beets, working atop the sugar bins, and helping to fill train cars with sugar to be shipped out.

But mostly, Mitton remembers cleaning because sugar dust is explosive.

"You'd vacuum and vacuum and vacuum to keep it clean," he said.

Now he looks at the old agricultural buildings and, like many in Longmont, wonders what, if anything, will happen to them.Kurt Wimmer, a spokesman for the cooperative, said there are no plans to change anything about the silos. The company needs them.

"It is a well-utilized site," he said.

Sugar rolls in on trains and may leave either on train or trucks to be sold in the Denver markets.

Similarly, the sugar factory has no changes in store in the foreseeable future, according to owner Dick Thomas of Denver.

The site itself is rife with speculation and hope for redevelopment. It is on the list of proposed sites for a rail park, but plans are in flux.

Decades of sugar production at the factory left tons of calcium carbonate on the site. Dick's son Steve Thomas said the site has 17.5 acres of the lime that is 60 feet deep with mounds piled on top and plainly visible south of the Ken Pratt Boulevard extension west of Third Avenue.

An employee climbs stairs inside the silos used by Western Sugar Cooperative in December 2009. (Lewis Geyer/Times-Call)
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LEWIS GEYER
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He sold 14,000 tons to the Environmental Protection Agency, which used it to neutralize acidic soil for a river revitalization project, he said. However, Steve Thomas said he and his father still have 360,000 tons of the soft, chalky substance on the property and it poses a challenge to redevelopment. While plants can grow on it, it is not a good foundation for buildings.

"It is not hot lime," Dick Thomas said. "It is literally neutral as far as the pH. It is a really good supplement for growing potatoes and mushrooms."

Steve Thomas is researching uses for the lime, including possibly using it in coal mines to reduce the risk of explosions. Still, he said, it would have to be cleaned and strained for that use.

Dick Thomas said his family bought the factory in October 1980 hoping to lease it back to a sugar manufacturer. However, the staple industry collapsed in the 1980s, leaving the Thomases with the factory and few prospects.

The Longmont factory was not the first in Colorado. That honor belongs to Loveland's factory, which began operating in 1901. Longmont's came online in 1903 and joined Great Western Sugar Co. in 1905, according to Times-Call history on the industry. The factory was a major employer and boasted a major role in the city's development, with more than 7,000 farms in three states shipping beets to Longmont for sugar production.

Dick Thomas said the location of the property east of the city's downtown, other pressing redevelopment issues like the Twin Peaks Mall and the Butterball plant, and ongoing questions about environmental cleanup seem to have left the property stagnant for now. Some hopes to develop the area into condos seem stymied by odor issues from the city's wastewater treatment facility west of the factory. Efforts to mitigate the odors haven't totally solved the issue, he said.

"Really, with the economy the way it is, nobody can decide what the uses are," he said of the 110,000-square-foot factory.

The Longmont sugar factory was not the first in Colorado. That honor belongs to Loveland's factory, which began operating in 1901. Longmont's came online in 1903 and joined Great Western Sugar Co. in 1905, (Times-Call file)
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RICHARD M. HACKETT
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